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Thursday, August 27, 2015

Oh my stars! It's another flimsy finish!

I've been sewing my little fingers to the bone, trying to finish quilts for the quilt show. And I have another finish to share with you! Remember these?

Here is where they live now:

My Lucky Stars

Presenting "My Lucky Stars"! The little sneak peek stars are the cornerstones in the sashing on another Block Lotto win. (The colors in this photo aren't true to life. That is red in the quilt, not the hot pink that's it looks like on my computer screen.) These are the Tall Stars that I won back in August 2013.

blocks on the floor

Here is where I started, with my initial layout of 48 blocks. The block was an adaptation of Bonnie Hunter's Maverick Stars, except that it was made in a rectangular size, using red for the background. You could do a scrappy background, with one fabric for the star, or one fabric for the background with a scrappy star. These were so fun to make! If you want to try one, here is a link to the info on Block Lotto. I got the idea of putting the stars together like this from Joe Tulips. Thanks, Julie!

darkest & lightest blocks side-by-side

I decided on a dark to light layout, but I'm not sure you can tell from the photos. It runs diagonally across the quilt, with the darkest block in the bottom left corner and the lightest block in the top right corner in the photo at the top of the post. I tried to find a red solid that worked with all of the scrappy reds in the blocks. I was kind of surprised when I compared the darkest block to the lightest block. That red center square, which is the red solid I found, looks like 2 different colors in these two blocks! Isn't that interesting?

After I got the center assembled, The Potter suggested I add some triangles that echo the star legs in the blocks into the border. I thought that sounded good, so I proceeded to make a bunch of them. I really wasn't quite sure what I was doing when I started. I seem to flail about for a while before I figure out what I'm doing, but I eventually got into the swing of it. The only downside was the absolute mess I made in the quilt studio. I have red scraps and bits of fabric everywhere! I ended up using all of that red solid except for one strip about 6 inches (the width of the border) by 12 inches. Whew! That was close!

Here is one of those little cornerstones from the sneak peek.

In one cornerstone, I decided to do something different, and made one big wonky star.

Some of those crazy triangles in the border.

Anybody recognize the blocks you made?

This quilt has gone to the quilter now, and I'm so excited to see this one done.

The next quilt is on the design wall. I've gotten my Traveling Round Robin blocks back, and that quilt is on it's way to being completed. I hoping to get to flimsy stage over the weekend.

As most of you know, Washington is having a horrible, record-setting fire season this year. Most of the fires are in Eastern Wash. and I live in Western Wash. This was what the sunrise looked like last Sunday morning. That is a smoky sky! It stayed that way all day. It smelled strongly of smoke, and we had ash falling on the cars. I can only imagine, if it was that bad here, how bad was it where there are the fires? My heart goes out to all that are affected by the fires, and I applaud all the firefighters doing so much to stop those fires. We're all praying for some rain. It looks like our prayers may be answered this weekend. I just hope some of the rain makes it over the Cascades to the eastern part of the state.